Casa de Fierro
| The Iron House | |
|---|---|
La Casa de Fierro Template:Es icon | |
.jpg) | |
 | |
| Alternative names | La Maison de Fer Template:Fr icon |
| General information | |
| Type | House |
| Location | Iquitos,  Peru |
| Address | streets Próspero/Putumayo |
| Coordinates | 3°44′59.49″S 73°14′38.41″W / 3.7498583°S 73.2440028°W |
| Current tenants | "The Café of the Amazon" (restaurant; first and second floors) |
| Construction started | 1887 (creation in Belgium) |
| Completed | 1889 (prefabrication state) |
| Inaugurated | 1890 (built in Iquitos) |
| Owner | Judith Acosta Vda. De Fortes |
| Technical details | |
| Structural system | Precompression |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect(s) | Gustave Eiffel[dubious – discuss] |
| Awards and prizes | Cultural Heritage of Peru |
La Casa de Fierro (archaism, English: the Iron House, French: La Maison de Fer), located in the city of Iquitos in the jungle of Peru, in front of the major square between Próspero and Putumayo streets, is a large iron residence built during the rubber boom at the end of the nineteenth century. First, the house had been previously bought by the Bolivian explorer and entrepreneur Antonio Vaca Diez.
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La Casa de Fierro is one of the finest as well as best-preserved samples of civil architecture in Peru. The walls, ceiling, and balcony are plastered in rectangular sheets of iron. It is said to be the first prefabricated house in the Americas.[1] Although popularly said to have been designed by the French architect Gustave Eiffel, there is no evidence that this is true; the building does not reflect his architectural style.[2] The unsubstantiated claims say it was built in the Belgian workshops of Les Forges D´Aiseau. Rubber baron Anselmo del Aguila bought it at the International Exposition of Paris in 1889.[citation needed] Once dismantled, it was brought in pieces to Iquitos (the metal sheets were carried by hundreds of men through the jungle), and assembled there in 1890.[citation needed]
Since 1985, it is being administered by the Club Social de Iquitos; which has contributed in its restoration. Its second floor now has a restaurant.
A fully different story of the origin of the house is told in Mario Vargas Llosa's Captain Pantoja and the Special Service (Pantaleón y las visitadoras), a comic novel.
See also
References
- ^ Practiguia Peru, First ed., pag. 261. Peru Guia S.R.L., Lima, 1994 Template:Es icon
- ^ [1], The New York Times, October 29, 2014.
External links
Media related to Casa de Fierro at Wikimedia Commons
- Juegos Divertidos
- Iquitos: following the route of the rubber boom
- Template:Fr icon La Casa de fierro d'Iquitos (Pérou): Une oeuvre du "magicien du fer" (Gustave Eiffel) en pleine Amazonie
- Template:Fr icon La Casa de Fierro d'Iquitos (Pérou): Gustave Eiffel en pleine Amazonie
- (German) Monsieur Eiffel in the Amazonian Jungle
- Iquitos Times "Any Old Iron?"
- ikitos.com A brief history of the Iron House.